Warm Me Up
by flamingosarepeopletoo
Summary: It's natural for Natsu to want to comfort Lucy when she's stepping out of an unhealthy relationship. NaLu. AU. One Shot.


**Just a quick little one shot before I go to bed. ;)**

 **I got a request on tumblr for 'Natsu warms Lucy up' and I was like hey, this could work.** **So don't mind me while I scribble two thousand words of NaLu fluff and shove it in your faces.**

 **Please enjoy!**

* * *

Lucy's teeth chattered as the rough morning air hit her face. Her blonde hair was swept messily around her chin to further prevent the wintry frost from reaching her neck. Her lips held a crusted layer of chapped nothingness and her eyes were coated with a thin layer of tears. She opened her mouth, huffing out and watching the cold air particles bundle together around her before puffing out into the cold, drenched atmosphere.

Her hands shook violently underneath the wool sweater she was currently dressed in. Her heart raced and her eyes darted involuntarily to her phone's screen for the third time in the last minute. A lone text message lay forgotten. It was sent two hours ago, and read almost instantly after being discharged. There hadn't been a reply, though. There were never replies.

Her boyfriend of almost a year now never bothered to show her much attention, but Lucy didn't mind until much recently. She was idly making a birthday cake for him, and sent him a little teaser of the frosting. He replied with a simple ' _Whatever'_ , and that was that. In a normal situation, Lucy would have just brushed it off as him being busy, but it had already happened one too many times before. Her heart ached every time she was left alone or forgotten, and it just didn't sit well with her.

So today she had asked to meet him at the coffee shop near her apartment at promptly five o'clock. She only had one goal in mind: to finally break things off with him. After months of suffering the way she did, she decided enough was enough and was ready to untie the knot. Her fingers trembled with anticipation, glancing at the time on her phone. It read four-fifty, so there was still a good ten-to-twenty minutes before she even expected him to leave wherever he was.

"Luce? What're ya' doing here?"

She whipped her head around to see her best friend since childhood, Natsu Dragneel, enter the coffee shop. He was bundled in a thick red coat and his signature white, scaly scarf was tied around his neck. His pink hair was just as spiky and loose like it always had been, and his eyebrows were raised, directed at her.

"Natsu?" Lucy asked, her head cocking to the side in confusion. It was rare the pink-haired guy ever stepped foot into cafés and hangouts like this, so to see him standing so casually in the entrance was a surprise to her. "What happened to you? I've never seen you in this kind of place before."

"Gray asked me to run an errand for him," Natsu explained hastily, making his way to the counter and promptly saying, "One steaming hazelnut coffee please with five creams and twenty sugars. Yes, I said twenty sugars. Oh, and can ya' make it look like it doesn't have anything in it? Yeah, it's a prank, how'd you know? It was obvious? Suit yourself, bro."

Lucy watched in mild amusement as Natsu walked over to her table with the weird order in his right hand while a plain spicy peppermint coffee rested in his left. She raised an eyebrow when he began to slurp it down.

"Doesn't Gray like regular iced black coffee?" she asked, absentmindedly sipping at her own drink. She had gone for a simple hot chocolate as she really wasn't in the mood to drink anything that had too much caffeine in it. She didn't want to sound too hyper when she broke the news to her boyfriend about them breaking up.

"Yeah, but he should'a known better than to trust me with his coffee," Natsu shrugged. He set his- empty- mug down and flashed the blonde an ear-splitting grin. "Anyway, what's up with you? You looked a bit sad when I walked in."

Lucy sighed. Natsu was bound to find out soon enough anyway, and she'd rather have him hear it from herself. "Called the boyfriend up to meet me here at five."

Natsu cocked an eyebrow. "Well, it's…" He glanced at the clock, "five-oh-five right now, sooo…"

Lucy shrugged. "He probably hasn't even left his house yet. Or wherever he is."

"I don't get it," Natsu started. "I know you don't like him much anymore, and everyone knows he doesn't like you anymore. Why're ya' still hanging on?"

"I'm not," Lucy admitted. "I texted him to meet me today because I want to break up with him. He never replied to my text, but thank Mavis he doesn't know I sneaked onto his phone and turned his 'read messages' signal on."

Natsu snorted at that. "That's funny," he said, smirking. "And good for you, Luce. I'm… happy you're finally moving on from that jerk."

Lucy hummed and nodded. "I am too," she said softly. Her mind raced as she recalled the past year with her soon-to-be ex-boyfriend. "Dammit…" she whispered, throwing her head back and running her fingers through her hair. "Dammit dammit dammit."

"What? What is it, Luce?" Natsu asked, instinctively reaching his hand out and placing it on her free one which was still resting on the table. "Are… are you okay?"

"Dammit," was Lucy's only reply. "Dammit, Natsu, I… I can't believe I wasted so much time on that guy."

To her surprise, Natsu flinched. "I can't either," she faintly heard him whisper. In a louder, clearer voice, he then said, "I'm sorry, Lucy."

"He ignored every single one of my texts, cancelled on all of our dates, probably cheated on me a few times, and now he won't even show up to our break-up," Lucy said, her voice getting quieter and quieter with each passing word. "I'm such an idiot, Natsu. I can't… he made a fool out of me, and now I don't know what to do with myself."

Her head was hurting and spinning around in circles over and over again. Her lips parted slightly and her vision hazed. She could shakily make out Natsu's figure still in front of her, his eyebrows furrowed and his eyes filled with an emotion she couldn't quite place.

Unlike her lame excuse of a boyfriend, Natsu was _always_ there for her. Whenever she cried, he always stayed with her. Whenever she wanted to rant to him about what happened in her favorite manga, he would quietly sit by and listen to her. Whenever she was happy, he laughed and joked along with her. It was a wonder why he hadn't already gotten himself a girlfriend, but Lucy knew that was something only he could decide upon. Sure, he'd been asked out a few times, and many times it occurred in front of Lucy, and she would be lying if she said something weird clenched in her chest whenever it happened, but the feeling quickly subsided when he shot every single one of those girls down.

When she'd ask, he'd always reply with a simple "They aren't you." Lucy didn't know exactly how to take that.

"Natsu, I… am I really that much of an idiot? Can you believe how much time I've wasted on that guy, because I sure can't."

Then, Natsu was speaking, and she was listening. "Lucy, stop berating yourself. You're an amazing girl and you're my best friend. I don't choose random people to be my best friend, Luce, but you're really special. You're kind, awesome, and a little bit weird-"

"Hey!"

"The point is, you're not the one that's the idiot, _he_ is. He doesn't know what kind of an amazing person you are, and that's his loss," Natsu continued. In a lower voice, he added, "I'm just glad _I_ know what kind of person you are."

"What?" Lucy asked, leaning closer to hear him better. "What do you mean by that?"

"Shit! You weren't supposed to hear that!" Natsu quickly said, shaking his hands back and forth. "Gahhh whatever."

"Funny," Lucy said, a sad smile creeping onto her lips, "that's exactly what he said."

Natsu stayed silent after that.

"Gosh, Natsu, I'm such a mess," Lucy whispered, wrapping her arms around herself and snuggling into the sweet warmth of her abundant layers of cloth. She glanced up, but when she saw his stricken expression, her eyes gained a glossy overcoat of tears. Her bottom lip trembled and she was just about ready to burst out crying. Natsu noticed this, and quickly leapt up out of his seat, walking up behind her, bending down, and wrapping himself around her. His arms laid just above her chest and he nuzzled into her neck, causing her to lean back into his touch. "D-do you think I d-deserved this? Was I meant to be insulted like this?"

"No," Natsu immediately replied. "No of course you weren't. You're just a girl. A sensitive, playful girl who I've grown to care for a lot."

Lucy, finally, cracked a small, pitiful smile at his words. She reached up, holding his elbows with her dainty fingers and sighing deeply. "Thank you," she whispered. "Thank you, Natsu… for everything you've ever done for me."

"Yeah," Natsu said, before finally letting go of her and reaching out on the table to take her phone into his hands. He cradled it in his grasp, ignoring the look of confusion that now painted Lucy's delicate face-features. "Just gimme a sec," he said, and Lucy watched him as he appeared to be typing something.

She gasped in awe when he finally gave her the cell phone back. Lucy stared directly at the screen, where she saw a brand new text message that was just sent to her boyfriend.

' _Don't want to meet me? Fine. I'm breaking up with you. Enjoy your life sucker!'_

Lucy looked blankly up at Natsu, who was currently wearing a huge grin, and then back at the screen.

"Don't you think the exclamation point was a bit much?" was the only thing she said.

"Hey! Exclamation points help you get your point across!" Natsu said pointedly, to which Lucy finally let out a low, melodious laugh.

"Well, thank you," Lucy said, "although your text break-ups are pretty intense. Let's hope I never have to go through anything like that. Especially that exclamation point, jeez." She was teasing him, and he knew that.

Natsu looked at her. "You won't have to."

Lucy blinked, and a pang of something she didn't recognize coursed through her entire body. What did he mean by that? By saying she never had to go through a text break-up with him, did that mean that her chances with Natsu were completely eliminated?

There was no point in denying it anymore, in Lucy's opinion. Over the course of her last unhealthy relationship with her now-ex-boyfriend, and going through everything with Natsu at her side, she had definitely come to terms with her growing feelings for him. She had to face it. She was madly in love with him, and she knew it. After knowing him for practically her entire life, she couldn't withhold her feelings for the pink-head any longer.

But now, she was second-guessing herself.

"What?" she asked, her hopeful thoughts shattering with every passing moment. Natsu's eyes quickly widened.

"Wait! That came out wrong! I meant that you don't have to worry about going through a break-up with me because I'll never break up with you! Gaahh that was too straightforward. Okay you know what, just pretend I never said anything in the first place and I-"

"Are you asking me out?" Lucy asked, incredulous. Natsu stopped, his facial expression changing a few times before settling into one Lucy recognized as relief. A broad grin made its way onto Natsu's face and he was unable to hold back a low, breathtaking laugh.

"Uh… kinda?" he said, his statement coming out more as a question.

Lucy's lips twisted upwards and her eyes lit up with excitement and happiness. Her emotions were overflowing and she knew she was about to burst any minute out of sheer delight.

"Yes! I say yes!" she quickly said, jumping up out of her seat to leap into his arms, hugging him tightly. "Just make sure you don't ignore my texts and don't make up excuses and don't do anything bad like he did and just don't-"

"Luce. _Luce,_ " Natsu said, lifting a finger and placing it on her lips. She giggled at his touch, leaning into it and not being able to wipe the giddy look off of her face.

But then, just as their moment was about to be further advanced, a short _ping_ interrupted them. Lucy glanced down in the direction of her phone, watching as a text flood into her messaging platform. Unable to keep her curiosity at bay, she picked up her device and scanned the text, not minding Natsu peeping over her shoulder.

' _Good luck getting a new boyfriend as great as me.'_

Lucy, smirking, didn't hesitate to respond.

' _I already got a new boyfriend, but he's nothing like you. He actually makes me happy.'_


End file.
